


Weapon of choice

by Anuna



Series: Monsters [5]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Anger, Canon Compliant Violence, F/M, Future Fic, Gen, Redemption, and everyone who let him down, and protects his teammates, angry at everything, being true to his name, beserker staff, dark!Ward, in which Ward is angry, in which Ward is trying to atone for his sins, monsters 'verse, speculation on what Skye's lineage could mean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-08
Updated: 2014-06-08
Packaged: 2018-02-03 21:23:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1757375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anuna/pseuds/Anuna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"To think that people took better care of a <i>gun</i> than of a person - a human person - I would be bloody pissed off too."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Weapon of choice

**Author's Note:**

> One of the things I want the most in second season is to see Ward pissed off and angry at everyone who let him down (and that is pretty much everyone, SHIELD included because they never noticed what kind of a psychopathic predator Garrett was, or what he'd done to Ward). 
> 
> This fic comes from that, and from the idea that once you accept your own darkness (and pain, and anger), it can't hurt you any more. Hence the Beserker staff which doesn't necessarily have to be destroyed - I'd really love to see Ward holding the whole damn thing and keeping himself in check, some day when he's solid enough to look at his own darkness. Uh anyway. This is not my usual MO, so any and all comments and thoughts will be very much appreciated. This belongs to the same 'verse as "Burn up", and I have several more ideas for it, but they don't come in chronological order, so next time there might be a fic set in the middle of Ward's own healing process.

The way he wakes up is reminiscent of another time and another situation. He feels someone's hands on his hair and anchors himself in the sensation until his vision isn't a blur any more. The floor and the air around him are humid and cold. He inhales and recognizes the scent of the person keeping his head in her lap. 

“Simmons,” he rasps. She looks at him with the same concern and care. Thinking that he doesn't deserve it is a reflex he can't kick. Deciding he wants to be the person who deserves it takes more willpower than he feels he has, but he repeats it to himself. 

“Oh thank God,” she says in a rush. “Fitz, he's awake.”

Two of them are peering down at him. “Where's Skye?” he asks. Simmons and Fitz share a look, which conveys more than words would. He knows those were Raina's men that ambushed them. He assumes they're inside some kind of a compound. “Great,” He says, starting to get up. Both Fitz and Simmons help him sit. “Any idea where we are?” 

Fitz looks around. “It's an old place. Like, 1940s kind of old?”

“There are ways to get out,” Simmons says, looking at him. Ward rubs his forehead. “They didn't tie us down, and they didn't bother to prevent us from getting out.”

“And that's not very good,” Fitz adds. It's not a question. Ward looks at them – they both have either learned too much from him, or not enough. He isn't sure he likes this, but he doesn't want them defenseless. 

“Either they've got what they wanted,” he says, watching the realization dawning on both faces, “Or they have a lot of people outside.” 

“Or both,” Simmons says.

“People with Beserker staff,” Fitz adds, frowning. For a moment Ward eyes him. The damn thing refuses to go away, but that might not be bad this time. They need a weapon, but guns would be of limited use right now. They need something to help them break through. Fitz catches his eye and seems to read his mind. 

“Ward, you're not thinking -”

“It's exactly what I'm thinking.”

“But the way it affected you the first time around,” Simmons objects, and for a very brief moment Ward makes a very conscious note of the fact that she doesn't want him to get hurt. He stores it away for later, because there _will_ be later. He will give them a later. He is getting them, all of them, out of here.

“I know,” he says, much like the old Agent Ward would, in a calm and almost soothing way, assuring them like someone who knows how to handle the situation. How to eliminate the threats. And the thing is, he does know. “I was a different person then,” he adds.

Old Agent Ward was afraid of being a monster. This Agent Ward is aware of being one. 

*

The first part is easy – the hard one awaits after he crawls out of the ventilation shaft, takes two guards down and walks over to the box containing it. It. The weapon. 

He can practically _smell_ it. 

It's just a means. His hand opens the box. _He_ is a weapon, but a weapon wielding himself. He chooses. He knows. There's nothing this piece of metal can show him any more, nothing horrible that he hadn't already faced in a mirror.

Fitz shuffles behind him. 

“Ward,” he says warily. Grant doesn't turn around. He knows what he'll see, and doesn't want to see it, but Fitz doesn't let go. “Ward, look at me.” 

He is done with being a coward. So he turns around. He makes himself do it. 

Briefly he sees the airtight door and two faces behind the security glass. _It was supposed to float_. He wanted to cheat the death and life. But you can't cheat your way through life, and you can't cheat the death either. 

 

(You learned that, didn't you, John?)

 

“You don't have to do this,” Fitz says, and Simmons just looks. 

“I have to,” he says, and a second later, “I choose to.”

“Ward -,” Simmons chokes out. “Just... be careful,” she says. 

He nods. There is no more point to wait. Nothing more he could do to prepare himself. He has breathed his own anger like salty air since he remembers. It can't poison him any more than it did. 

Holding the first piece feels like sliding back home, like finding something terrible and familiar again. Gripping the piece with his bare hand feels almost like relief. It's recognition in the most basic sense, the sound of his own blood rushing through him. The feeling burns up his arm and down his throat and he breathes through it. The second one is a knock in the middle of his chest, but what used to pin him to the ground before only sends him staggering a step back. Absently, he notices how Fitz watches him. Another breath and he recovers. _Yes_. He's that thing crouched in the darkness, staring ahead, barring its fangs and waiting to strike. Yes. All of the darkness inside his hands. All the anger. He puts it together, his weapon of choice - not the staff, not the alien power. No. It's not about the thing he's holding. It's about seeing his demons, staring back at them and refusing to curl up. Refusing to run. The thing in the dark is so angry, so hateful and dangerous, but it can't scare him any more. 

He puts together his weapon of choice. 

The third piece is like a knife in the middle of his ribs. He chokes back the shock and lets it march through him instead – his younger siblings and older brother, his absent mother and cold hearted father; jumping off the plane after Simmons and Fitz's face covered in icing, and the way Skye recoiled from him, her hands tied to the metal railing. The first time Garrett put a gun in his hand and the way Garrett made him his personal gun; the muffled sound of Fitz and Simmons screaming behind his back. It _burns_ , burns all the way from his fingertips and through his veins, the knowledge of believing in a lie, of wasted life and loyalty, of giving up everything he had for _nothing_. Not being able to speak and not being able to explain. The moment Skye called him a monster and the moment he wanted her to become one; the prison guards and social workers and SHIELD agents, all of them too comfortable to ever ask him the right questions, or too fucking stupid allowing a junior agent trick them all. Every time he fired a gun when he didn't want to, and the way it felt when he realized not wanting to hurt was not good enough and following orders was not an excuse; every moment and every thought of last thirty years, all of it trapped in his chest, itching through his fingertips, burning from his eyes. He could rip the world apart with it. 

“Ward?” It's Simmons and her voice is worn and thin when he straightens, all three pieces of the staff in place. 

Does he look like a monster? 

Does it matter? 

He looks at Simmons. She shudders, but her eyes are not scared of him. 

“It's... better than it looks like,” he says, and it's not that she doesn't believe him. He can see, despite the staff and the anger that she is concerned. “Don't worry,” he manages. 

Fitz finds two guns for himself and Simmons, Ward watches them readying themselves and holds the staff tighter. He holds it so that Fitz and Simmons would never have to fire those guns. 

“Let's go,” he says, walking towards the door. Beyond it, all hell breaks loose. 

 

*

It's never about the weapon you use. It's what you make of it. 

The guards don't stand a chance and the doors crack under his assault. He makes a way through the compound like a juggernaut, and leaves nothing in his wake, destruction matching the condition of his life – _nothingness_ , that's what his entire life was, and nothingness it will stay if he doesn't get them out, if he doesn't find Raina if he doesn't stop her. 

_Nothing_. And he himself is nothing then, nothing, just a weapon without a purpose if he doesn't protect them; so he will. He will, at any cost, he _will_ get them out, he will find Skye, Raina won't touch her, and if she tries, she will pay. The final door shatters as if it were made of thin glass and he storms inside and sees her. (The thing hiding in dark within his chest growls). Skye is tied to a table and trying to get free, not going down without a fight. Her hair is wild and so are her eyes and he sees red. He's a monster, he's a goddamn giant and he will crush them all.

He doesn't feel the first bullet and barely notices the second. Third one grazes him and forth one hits his leg, sticking deep. And yet he doesn't fall. But he hears Simmons shouting and sees Skye breaking free. She runs for him, but the next punch comes from behind and sends him crashing down. Someone screams and someone grabs his shoulder as he drops the staff from his hand. It's like an electric jolt and after it emptiness filling his chest as he feels his own blood running away from him. 

*

He wakes in stages. It's like a slow, dragging climb back up to consciousness. First he feels his body but cannot move, can hear but cannot understand. He nearly wakes and slips back and nearly wakes again. His limbs are all heavy and his head empty. He thinks that there might be people around him, but the sounds and sensations are so fleeting, he can't possibly hold onto them long enough to be certain. 

First time he opens his eyes, it's Simmons who's there. It's just a glimpse of her always shiny hair and competent hands. 

“Oh, you're awake, thank God,” she says and he hears relief. He doesn't think he deserves it, or her hand on his cheek, but he tries to nod, to smile, tires so hard. 

Next time he thinks it's May who's there. He thinks it's her voice and he thinks how he let her down, he thinks how he tore them all apart. He thinks of her anger and understands it. He held it in his hands too, the entire weapon and in that moment it was crystal clear. And he wants to tell her, wants to apologize, but whatever he manages to get out isn't what he wants to say. 

“Calm down and rest,” May instructs, her voice inflection less but not unkind. “You did good.”

It's Coulson who's there when his eyes open and voluntarily stay that way. He has his grey suit and his blue tie but his expression is pinched and not at all composed. 

“That was too much of a risk,” he says. 

“They had Skye,” Ward manages. 

“It was too much of a risk,” Coulson repeats, steadier now, the way Ward remembers from before. “You could have died,” Coulson says and Ward is about to answer that it doesn't matter, that he doesn't matter, that he is a weapon, a line. He is their shield, and he is happy to be one. It's him who's supposed to go. “No,” Coulson says patiently. “Don't say it. Don't even try.”

*

Next time he wakes, he is thirsty. It's the middle of the night. He tries to move – manages to lift his hand and next to him something shuffles. The light flickers to life and he sees Skye, with messy hair and tired eyes. 

“Hey,” she says. “Thank God.”

Her hand is tinted blue, but lighter than he is used to seeing. Her face is normal color, cheeks and lips and chin, and the neckline he can see as she leans over him. Her hair falls around him like a curtain. He closes his eyes, forgetting everything else. 

“Skye,” he says. It's the best sound he knows, the most powerful protective spell. Everything around him turns silent and safe, like the world covered with the first snow. She strokes his cheek. Everything else goes away. 

“Never do that again,” she says. “Ever.”

He opens his eyes and manages a half smile. Asking him not to protect her (or any of them for that matter) is like asking him not to breathe. There's just one way he would stop. 

“She was going to hurt you,” he says. “She'd turn you into -”

Skye shakes her head. 

“You told me that what I can accept cannot control me,” she says. It makes him look at her in alarm, but her skin is clean, clear of blue marks. It's okay. She is okay. He breathes out relief and she smiles. “I'm fine, Ward, it's you who got us all worried. They shot you four times -,” her voice cracks, “and when you dropped that goddamn thing your entire body crashed from an adrenaline high,” she traces his cheek with her fingers, his lips and the lines on his forehead. “Never do that again.”

When she kisses the corner of his lips all of his protests die. So instead of explaining that he is there to protect them (his definition, his choice, his _oath_ ), he tries to turn into the kiss. It makes her smile and kiss him once more, on the lips. “I'll try not to,” he says. 

*

In the morning he wakes up to Fitz sitting in a chair next to him, typing on a tablet computer. 

Ward coughs. Fitz looks up. 

“Oh you're awake,” he says. “Great. Are you thirsty?”

Ward nods. Fitz moves around the room with ease – adjusts Ward's bed and pillow and brings the ice chips. 

“Take your time with these,” Fitz says. “I know how you're feeling, but you shouldn't get anything into yourself too quickly.”

The ice feels like the best thing ever. Ward settles for slow breathing after that, readjusting to being awake and properly taking in his surroundings, the IV line, the machines beeping behind him and a wide bandage across his chest. He can bend his right leg and move the left one a little bit. He knows there's a bandage on his left thigh even though he doesn't see it. Things start to hurt. It's not pleasant, but it's a good sign. Healing always hurts. He shifts and adjusts and eventually drifts off again. 

When he wakes up, Fitz is still there, still working. Ward has no idea how much time had passed, but there are two new IV bottles hanging above his head. 

“Fitz?” his voice is scratchy and his throat like sandpaper. 

“Yeah? Do you need something?”

He would like some more ice, but he doesn't mention it. Instead his eyes slide off Fitz and into the empty space. “Ward?” 

Fitz gets up and brings him the ice chips. Ward's hands are still unsteady, but he manages to hold the cup and help himself with tiny bits of ice, and Fitz patiently waits, standing next to him until he's done. “Good,” he says and goes back to his seat. 

“How long have you been here?” Ward asks. 

“Awhile. Skye was here too, but I guess you were sleeping.”

Ward processes that. Wants to tell Fitz that they don't have to do this. That he doesn't deserve it. That he hurt them all too much. But before he can say anything, it's Fitz who speaks, in that focused yet disconnected manner of his, his eyes trained somewhere in the distance. 

“You were really angry back there,” he starts. “I have never seen anyone angry like that. Not ever. It was actually frigtening, and don't get me wrong, I wasn't afraid of you -”

“Maybe you should have been,” Ward says. Fitz aims a slight frown at him. 

“Well, I'm not.”

“I nearly killed you, Fitz.”

“It was supposed to float. You knew that.”

“And I was ordered to kill you and Simmons,” Ward insists. He didn't want to. He wanted to scream but he couldn't fight against it. Her couldn't even look at them. 

“Were you doing that, Ward?” Fitz asks. He leans forward, a small man who cannot really fight, but never backs down, and Ward realizes, properly, that Fitz has never been afraid of him. “Answer me.”

“No,” Ward exhales. “But I wasn't saving you either.”

“Technically you were and you did.”

“Intentions are not good enough. I was a -”

“A weapon,” Fitz cuts him off, determined. “You were his weapon. Or tell me I'm wrong.”

He's not. Ward closes his eyes. 

“You know, I have this friend in Edinburgh. Nice lad. Works in a museum. Got something for him in that last Hydra hideout we found,” Ward still winces at the mention of Hydra and supposes the reaction will never truly go away. “You know what we got?”

Ward doesn't say anything and Fitz waits until they look at each other eye to eye again. 

“A Luger,” he says. 

“A gun?”

“Yeah. Someone had one there. Trip looked at it. Straight out of World war two and has never been fired, or so Trip says, but I'd like you to look at it when you can. If you want. But. The point is this – that was a fancy gun of Wermacht officers, you know? Of course you know. And this one has never been fired from. It's spotless and shiny. And to think, that some Nazi officer first and then some Hydra goon who got it who knows where because Hydra parted ways with rest of them back in the World Ward two, anyway, to think that people took better care of a _gun_ than of a person... a human person,” Fitz pauses, his eyes serious and heavy and Ward can barely look at him. “I would be bloody pissed off too. You didn't deserve that, Ward.”

He closes his eyes. He cannot think. And he's angry, but right now it feels so pointless. They could have died. Skye could have gotten hurt in ways he doesn't even want to imagine. He failed them.

“You didn't,” Fitz says. Ward looks at him. “You said that one aloud.”

“You all could have -”

“Ward,” he says, pulling his chair closer. Ward can get a better look at him now, a faint scar near his hairline and the look that's as kind as it's always been. “You don't have to be a weapon. No, wait. I know that's what you think of yourself. But that's not all you are. You know how we got out? Skye got us out,” Fitz says. Ward pauses. Skye – her face was clear. There were no markings down the side of her neck, those that never went away no matter how calm she was. Could it be -? Fitz continues. “I don't know _what_ you taught her, Ward, but something happened there. She did something. It backfired on Raina. She wasn't in control any more – _Skye_ was.” 

Fitz looks at him, steady, calm, trusting. You shouldn't trust me, he thinks, but even that is in vain. They already do. But his mind isn't able to fight with itself because all he can think about is Skye. 

_What you can accept can't control you_. 

He closes his eyes, crushed by enormity of this. She believed him. 

“Ward?” Fitz calls. “Are you all right?” 

“Fine,” he lies. Fitz doesn't seem to buy it, but doesn't press the matter any further. Instead he goes back to his work. “Fitz?”

“Yes?” 

“What are you still doing here?”

Fitz looks at him like it's the most ridiculous question ever. 

“Staying. Taking care of you,” he says. 

Ward blinks, unable to comprehend it.

“Why?” 

“Because you need it,” Fitz says, like it's the most simple thing in the world.


End file.
